Thursday, March 7, 2013

The Metal Advisor Interviews Ben Higgins of The Reckoning

As a one-man band, Ben Higgins has faced countless challenges and fought to keep his dream alive. An instructor, the guitar player has transferred his vast knowledge of technique and metal music to his first full-length, Defining Armageddon, which features Rob Lundgren on vocals. The Metal Advisor talks to Ben via e-mail to see what's up on his end of the music world.

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Thanks for taking the time to answer
a few questions, Ben!

Ben: My pleasure! Thanks for asking them!

Eight years of unstable and drastic
line-up changes have helped you realize one thing: The Reckoning is a creative
force run by one man. Did your role as a guitar instructor have anything to do
with that?

Ben: Not really, no. Being a guitar instructor was something that
happened on the side, much later after the band was already going and had
endured several line-up changes by that point. I would say it was more down to
circumstances where everything came to a head with disagreements between me and
band members. It's not an easy situation for anyone if you have a solid vision
and a load of material written which already has an established identity.
People come into a band, wanting and expecting to jam and write music, have
their say about musical direction & general band decisions.

That's understandable, of course, but in a situation like
mine where I had a load of songs written, that had already been gigged with older
line-ups, it can breed resentment to new people coming in who were expecting
more of an input. The trouble is, I could choose to please everybody, but then
you end up diluting the music and your overall vision just for the sake of
keeping people happy. And, to me, damaging your art and your vision just to
please people is a complete waste of your life.

It was never an intention of mine to build up a catalogue of
material and be a band leader. It just happened by accident and so I've had to
adapt to that and approach it a
different way to the more "traditional" band scenario. All the experience of
disagreements and resentments over the years had led me to a firm belief, which
is this: I will do everything I can myself until I meet somebody who can do that
particular job better than I can and when that happens, I will happily let them
do it. And with that philosophy, I resolved to finally record the debut album
as the only thing that I couldn't do was sing!

Well, you’re almost a one-man band.
How did you meet your vocalist, Rob, and what made bonding so easy? Did you
just share similar taste in music?

Ben:
Well, Rob isn't actually in the band. He did it as a
session thing, so I guess I'm downgraded back to being a one-man band
again! I found a video of Rob singing some Judas Priest on YouTube,
and I
thought, "This guy's incredible. I'd love a voice like that for the
music." And so I got in touch. He's the real deal, a Swede who actually
looks like a
Viking. Plus, he was a pleasure to work with, a total gentleman and a
pro,
which was a refreshing change. It was like, "Wow, he can do that?" And
I'd ask
him, "I don't suppose you could...?" And, yes, he could!

How does it feel to finally have a
stable line-up to back the dream you’ve had for nearly a decade?

Ben: See above! I'll let you know when I find it !!

I have to ask, though, have you ever tried singing
yourself? Or was a dedicated vocalist more suited for the job? A little bird
told me you’re talented with various instruments.

Ben: I don't sing myself, no. I don't think it's something that
needs to be heard by the world! It did cross my mind because I was so
frustrated with dealing with other people letting me down, but I just knew deep
down that it wasn't the way to go. I knew that the kind of voice I'd imagined
for the songs was more in line with the great vocalists of the '80s--Halford,
Dickinson, etc, and I did doubt many times that I'd ever find that, but finding
Rob silenced the doubts, no problem!

Your debut record, Defining
Armageddon, features you and Rob in full force and is your first foray into the
metal world. How are you promoting it? Is the album spreading outside guitar
circles?

Ben: Just getting reviews and interviews together and keeping up
a presence online. I'm trying to work towards that ideal situation where your
official website becomes the most interesting place for people to check you
out, rather than the social media sites because if you rely on them too much,
you're subject to their changes. I think they're necessary and definitely
beneficial because I've met loads of great people through them, but your
official sites become the one place where you can craft the overall experience
and give something unique which they can't get on Facebook, etc.

Anyone who goes to the official site will see artwork
inspired by the songs, which I've drawn personally along with a bit of
background story, as well as an entire short graphic novel inspired by one of
the songs. Although it's not sophisticated and not had as much money thrown at
it as other bands, it's all 100% me.

The people who know me as a guitar instructor have been
incredibly supportive in spreading the word of The Reckoning and some of my
YouTube videos have brought people to it, too. Twitter's been great too, I have
to say. There's some brilliant people on there that I wouldn't have met any
other way and they've gone nuts hearing the songs.

Are your students begging to learn
your licks and riffs?

Ben: I have had quite a few requests to dissect the riffs, yes!
Who knows? I might make some videos and go through some of them one day.

How did you and Rob work around the
distance issue? —online interaction and sending tracks back and forth via
e-mail?

Ben: Yes, just online as you said. It was surprisingly smooth and
Rob's such a great vocalist and a patient man, so there weren't many times where
I needed to get him to do things again. The only difficult thing to get over
when working like this is uploading files--that's what takes so long. And if
your internet connection is as crappy as mine is, there can be many moments
of frustration!

Have you faced any other challenges
along the way?

Ben: Probably the same challenges most other bands and musicians
face. It's one thing finding people who are good at what they do, it's another
thing entirely to find people who are good at what they do, are decent people,
want the same things as you, and are prepared to work as hard as you to get it.
Finding all those things in one person and doing it four more times is a very rare
thing. So, I'm sure my experiences and stories will be similar to any other
band in that regard.

By far, the biggest challenge is self-belief. When you've got
other people questioning your judgement and pointing fingers at you it can be
hard not to lose faith and start believing the naysayers, but it's all part of
the challenge. Even working alone you still have the question of belief,
possibly even more so because you're not cushioned by having a gang of people
in the same boat as you. Either way, it's the thing that can make the difference
between giving up or refusing to give up, no matter how hard it gets.

I also know there's a lot of people who think I'm crazy to
be doing things this way, as one man. They don't think I can do it, or that I
shouldn't do it. But I am doing it. Black Sabbath's path wasn't the same as Iron
Maiden's path, which wasn't the same as Metallica's path, which isn't the same
as my path. Every situation is unique. There is no rule book for this stuff. If
you listen to people who tell you that you can't do something then you'll never
do anything.

Lay out a typical writing session
for me. Do you have any specific place you pull inspiration from or do you play
to your heart’s content until you create the basis of a song?

Ben: Most of the riffs just came out of nowhere whilst jamming
away on my own, but a few of the earlier riffs came out by accident whilst
jamming with a drummer way back in the beginning. Once I've got one good riff
happening, I just keep cycling it and allowing it to take me to another section
when it does. I usually just pull threads of ideas out of the air and follow
them wherever they go. I don't plan songs. I just let them happen naturally. I
also find it quite natural to play riffs in weird timings. To me, it's just
like walking and talking. We don't always talk at the same pace, yet we find it
easy... music is no different.

Occasionally, I'll be inspired to create a song from an idea
like an image or a story. But a lot of the time, the music happens first.

Was there any specific sound you
were going for or is the record a collection of your musical musings from
across a span of eight years?

Ben: All these songs were written near the beginning of The
Reckoning's formation. The only exception is "Vigilante," which was written in
late 2011, so they're old songs, really. Since then, I've written over two more
albums worth of material. However, I am glad that time has allowed me to make
improvements and tweaks to the arrangements of the songs from Defining
Armageddon, as I think they're much better now than they ever were.

One of my main issues with the album
is the lack of a drummer and a very plastic, inorganic drum sound. Despite the
unstable line-ups in the past, do you have any intention of seeking out a real
player?

Ben: That's a fair comment. From my point of view, I'd rather
have programmed drums that are playing everything like it should be and give
the songs the right consistency, tempo, and articulation than have a real
drummer who wasn't doing it justice. In this case, it really was more beneficial
to go back to the original demos I recorded for the songs and use the original
tempo maps and grooves because no matter what the line-up was, the songs never
managed to sound as coherent and consistent as those early demos I did.
Everyone who's heard the album has said the songs sound better than ever,
including my friend who's a drummer!

It is a compromise, for sure, but there are bands out there with
real drummers and their albums have an even less human sound than this one, so
I'm not too worried about it. I do intend to work with more musicians in the
future, but only if the situation is right. It's not worth me trying to gather a
band of local musicians right now as I'll just repeat the same problems as
before. I'll wait until I'm in the position to offer some serious musicians a
touring wage or something like that because, from my experience, people aren't
happy to join a band and play someone else's material unless they're getting
something from it, and I've got two more albums written that I want to work
through next, so I've got to be realistic about it. There might be people out
there who just want to be part of something and enjoy playing great music but
they're rare.

Do you have any plans for another
release? Maybe a few in-progress songs that didn’t make the first album?

Ben: Ah, see above! I'm working on the second right now. It's got
more dimensions than the first album, and I think it's really going to surprise
people.

Any shoutouts or last words? Thanks for a great interview, Ben!

Ben: I'd like to thank my agent, my manager, my
hairdresser...!No, I'd just like to say thanks for the interview and
can't wait to knock you all over with the second album!